samedi 30 janvier 2010

samedi

êtes-vous aussi fou que ça, que vous pensez à se suicider chaque jour? êtes-vous fatigué de cette douleur, de se reveiller le matin sous un manteau, les stigmates du satan sur le corps, entre les os, les bras courbaturés, les yeux pleins de larmes qui ne roulent pas? ne bougez plus pour vous protéger, devenez embryon sur le divan? regardez la télé ou buvez quelque chose pour nouer le cerveau? sautez les pillules, regardez-les, balancez-les, remplacez-les dans la boîte? ennuyez-vous comme un chat sous les nuages grisâtres? baignez dans le désespoire rouge? vivez la maladie encore, pourquoi pas?

c'est samedi, faites une mélodie, allez au vieux café, écrivez. oui, le jour est lourd, oui, vous ne pouvez pas vous lever. alors, fermez les yeux et rêvez du passé ou de l'avenir qui n'est pas fait. revez, revez... ne vous quittez pas. pas aujourd'hui. pas le samedi.

jeudi 28 janvier 2010

Howard Zinn has died

I can't stop thinking about Barack Obama's first state of the union address last night, given on the day that Howard Zinn has died. Governments lie. We bailed out the elites, Wall Street, with trillions of our tax dollars and with no consequences. Next? The people must continue to pay; discretionary spending (the people's needs) will be frozen beginning in 2011, education cut, health care cut, women's and children's needs put aside. However, the war chest will continue to grow unabated. Change we can believe in? Quelle mensonge, mon vieux. What are you going to do about it?












 

Thank you, Howard Zinn, for being one of our most important teachers of peace and war resistance.


mercredi 27 janvier 2010

Je suis francophile

rien n'a changé depuis que j'ai écrit ce poème en 2008...

i want a croissant
biftek poulet alain bashung
i want a new language
a post cinema verité
an avant garde nouvel roman
i want a song about lyon
or strasbourg or toulouse
i want to be pédé in gay ole' paris
or bi- in bretagne
I want to sit in an old theatre
and drink in bérénice
then go home and
write poetry à la ferré
i want to be risqué
i want to be un grand
i want an old barn for maison
and a terrace sur la seine
i want to take a train to cannes
and try this poem over again
i want to say "je vous aime"
like a true patriot
for once in my life
i want to say "vive la france"
without the guilt
throw off the shackles
i've felt since age 12
the American nightmare
adieu vietnam
bienvenue afghanistan
an endless maladie
tying me to a couch
with pills and pain
year after year after foutu year
my heart bursting with desire
my soul longing to speak
but the words are always foreign
always à la français
so no one gets the poems
even if my accent is good

mardi 26 janvier 2010

no more cryptic prayers

"You feel frustrated, depressed and life is unbearable, because you can't do the one thing you love to do most." ~ Rachel Ballon


i need a serious angel
a grand slab of reason
a knock on the head
with peaches and cream

anything but what i have
anything but this grand sadness

i need a national anthem
i need truth in reconciliation
i'm not a founder of nations
but an astute hanger-on

jazz for the masses
blues for my sorry soul

i need my old purple mountains
some good old fashioned philo
a poem that will rock my world
with a simple fait accompli

anything but what i see
anything but this droning tv
(and in hd, their eyes follow me)

i need and need and need some more
like a good american consumer girl
fuck my passions fuck them all
including obsessive jailhouse rock

alibis for living low alibis and more!
like dirty hair and dirty socks
(and dirty looks in the dark with dreams on)

anything but this sad city
any place but the pacific nw
any appendage but a one track head
anything but this sick fucking bed

i'm waiting for a letter that says
we've found you a woodland nest
and every word that you catch
counts for a basket

here in provence
here among the olives
inspired by italia
which lives on sur la langue

lady get up and
need no more!
break out because even small
animals have heard your prayers

and it's fait accompli, fait accompli
no more cryptic prayers no need

mercredi 20 janvier 2010

ghosts


i live in the silence that
you have left behind
a deep abiding silence
that sweeps upon the room
when i hear a certain song
or come upon a photo
or just hear your names
bubbling up from the nowhere
that subtly subsume my thoughts
color them with blues and grays
as i struggle with chaos

a hole opens up in my chest
like some sacred chakra
reserved for your absence
and like an accident victim
i absorb the shock and turn
pale and parched with no
sense of myself
there is only you
moving in and out of my
peripheral vision
deepening a wound

all your ghosts inhabit this
house like crowds of
pilgrims, brides and children
you knock at my heart
in the wee morning hours
when i lie still and soundless
it is then that your subtle
bodies enter my mouth and
infiltrate my dreams
i grab for the coverlets
sad and shivering
I grab for goblets and drink up

there is no transcendence
there is only you encompassing
year after lonely year
there is only you in the music
there is you here in the snow
and rain or in the rays of sunshine
when i eat my soup
when i put on my clothes
i feel you watch me
and bid me come away
such the angel in me would love
but it is the animal that lives on

lundi 18 janvier 2010

Benjamin Biolay: Ton Héritage

I've had this album, La Superbe  for months, since November when it was released, but I just listened to this song today for the first time. This translation is for my son, Joseph... xooxoxoxxooxo





TON HERITAGE
by Benjamin Biolay
and translation


Si tu aimes les soirs de pluie
If you love rainy nights
Mon enfant, mon enfant
My child, my child
Les ruelles de l'Italie
The back alleys of Italy
Et les pas des passants
And the steps of the passerbys
Eternelle litanie
Eternal litany
Des feuilles mortes dans le vent
Dead leaves in the wind
Qui poussent un dernier cri
That push a last cry
Crie mon enfant
Cry, my child

Si tu aimes les éclaircies
If you love lightning
Mon enfant, mon enfant
My child, my child
Prendre un bain de minuit
Taking a bath at midnight
Dans le grand océan
In the great ocean
Si tu aimes la mauvaise vie
If you love a wicked life
Ton reflet dans l'étang
Your reflection in a pond
Si tu veux tes amis
If you love to have your friends
Près de toi tout le temps
Near you all the time

Si tu pries quand la nuit tombe
If you pray when night falls
Mon enfant, mon enfant
My child, my child
Si tu ne fleuris pas les tombes
If you don't decorate the tombs
Mais chéris les absents
But cherish the departed
Si tu as peur de la bombe
If you are afraid of the bomb
Et du ciel trop grand
And of the too big sky
Si tu parles à ton ombre
If you speak to your own shadow
De temps en temps
From time to time

Si tu aimes la marée basse
If you love the low tide
Mon enfant, mon enfant
My child, my child
Le soleil sur la terrasse
Sun on the terrace
Et la lune sous le vent
And the moon beneath the wind
Si l'on perd souvent ta trace
If we often lose track of you
Dès qu' arrive le printemps
Just as spring comes
Si la vie te dépasse
If life passes you by
Passe mon enfant
Move on, my child

Ca n'est pas ta faute
This isn't your fault
C'est ton héritage
It's your inheritance
Et ça sera pire encore
And it will be worse yet
Quand tu auras mon âge
When you're my age
Ca n'est pas ta faute
This isn't your fault
C'est ta chair, ton sang
It's your flesh, your blood
Il va falloir faire avec
You are going to have to make do with
Ou plutôt sans
Or rather without

Si tu oublies les prénoms
If you forget first names
Les adresses et les âges
Addresses and ages
Mais presque jamais le son
But almost never the sound
D'une voix, un visage
Of a voice, a face
Si tu aimes ce qui est bon
If you love what is good
Si tu vois des mirages
If you see mirages
Si tu préfères Paris
If you prefer Paris
Quand vient l'orage
When a storm is coming

Si tu aimes les goûts amers
If you love bitter tastes
Et les hivers tout blancs
And winters all white
Si tu aimes les derniers verres
If you love the last call
Et les mystères troublants
And all the troubling mysteries
Si tu aimes sentir la terre
If you love to smell the earth
Et jaillir le volcan
And the volcano that spouts
Si tu as peur du vide
If you have fear of the void
Vide mon enfant
Empty out, my child

Ca n'est pas ta faute
This isn't your fault
C'est ton héritage
It's your inheritance
Et ça sera pire encore
And it will be worse yet
Quand tu auras mon âge
When you're my age
Ca n'est pas ta faute
This isn't your fault
C'est ta chair, ton sang
It's your flesh, your blood
Il va falloir faire avec
You're going to have to make do with
Ou plutôt sans
Or rather without

Si tu aimes partir avant
If you love to leave before
Mon enfant, mon enfant
My child, my child
Avant que l'autre s'éveille
Before the other awakens
Avant qu'il te laisse en plan
Before he leaves you in the cold
Si tu as peur du sommeil
If you are afraid of sleep
Et que passe le temps
and how time passes
Si tu aimes l'automne vermeil
If you love a red automn
Merveille rouge sang
Wonderous red blood

Si tu as peur de la foule
If you're afraid of crowds
Mais supporte les gens
But can stand people
Si tes idéaux s'écroulent
If your ideals escape


Le soir de tes 20 ans
The night of your 20th birthday
Et si tout se déroule
And if everything happens
Jamais comme dans tes plans
Never the way you plan
Si tu n'es qu'une pierre qui roule
If you are only a rock that rolls
Roule mon enfant
Roll, my child

Ca n'est pas ta faute
This isn't your fault
C'est ton héritage
It's your inheritance
Et ça sera pire encore
And it will be worse yet
Quand tu auras mon âge
When you're my age
Ca n'est pas ta faute
This isn't your fault
C'est ta chair, ton sang
It's your flesh, your blood
Il va falloir faire avec
You're going to have to make do with
Ou plutôt sans
Or rather without

Mon enfant...Mon enfant...
My child... my child... 

dimanche 17 janvier 2010

what's to be expected?


fame fame fame
that's all they think about
those artistes
those egoistes

they are more depressed about
their lack of fame than the fact
that they haven't written a new
song or poem in the last weeks,
months, years, more worried about
record companies and book deals than
whether or not their art is going
anywhere but on a shelf or melded
to plastic or into the fire of human
history, ash or bone.

i read that there is more depression in
this world about fame than anything
else: everyone wants to be famous,
a celebrity, a lead guitarist, a
brilliant poet, everyone wants to be
heard and seen, recognized as genius,
more than to have the muse descend in
the wind and knock them on the head and
wake them up to the fact that it's about
process and nothing else because in the
end you won't be remembered.

(99.999999% chance de disparition)

i feel like a worm if i haven't written
a poem in three days. but i too want to
heard, to be remembered, i just refuse to
become depressed about it anymore, what's
the use when i'm sure to be one of the
disappeared... just give me poems for
breakfast, lunch and dinner, i'll work, i
promise, i won't leave anything out, i'll
tell the truth the best i can, burn out
the flame, and go to bed, smacking my
lips and giving praise for the day.

jeudi 14 janvier 2010

Jean Fauque parle de sa collaboration

merci aux producteurs de ce vidéo qui donne une petite fenêtre sur la collaboration des amis, jean fauque et alain bashung, sur plusieurs chansons, le jour après qu'alain est passé de ce monde et est entré pour toujours dans nos cœurs. moi aussi, jean, j'aime la mieux ta chanson "mes bras", et moi aussi, j'ai pleuré souvent en l'écoutant, car c'est une chanson qui entre dans un tout autre domaine de l'art chanson, remplie de connaissance pour l'état humain. et toi, tu m'as touché lorsque tu l'as chanté à la sorbonne en octobre. http://www.myspace.com/jeanfauque


six



tableau: otto dix, self-portrait as mars, 1915

i returned to our astoria poetry workshop taught by laura anne brooks tonight and wrote the following as my first exercise of the year, using the number "6". evidament, je suis inondé par des pensées d'afghanistan...


six ducks
six goblets
six slugs of eau de vie

i'm dropping tears
like an iron-clad knight
on the battlefield

six drunks
six young'uns
six drummers drummin'

i'm proud of
who i've become
in the movies

the sixth part of me
bends with the celluloid text
i'm cut up in the editing

six tricky fingers
six civilians
six dead children

crowds of afghans
push their way
into the future

my own gang
lunges over the hill
and drops their rifles

a general will soon
receive a notice of
unintended slaughter

there will be a
review, a report, and
a trial by jury

no one will go to
jail because
we are all guilty

six positions
six civilians
@ sixty-six bullets

time runs out
the film ends
i am antihero

six black holes
six wounded warriors
six hoops of memory

i sit in my room
trembling and
await the slow crawl

six minutes
six months
sixty-six years

dimanche 10 janvier 2010

une voix qui pleure


for mano solo (24/04/63 - 10/01/2010)



je me souviens de
la première fois
que j'ai entendu tes pleures
ta voix d'enfant et d'homme
presque feminine
presque âme-sœur

avec "barbès-clichy"
je me suis trouvée là
parmi des misérables
à minuit seule sur un banc
ou à 18h lorsque
tout le monde passe
muet et aveugle

la tristesse de "janvier"
lorsque tu t'ouvrais la gorge
et tu saignais partout tes chants
d'une humanité perdue
nous rentrerons au port
avec des larmes pour une
vie coupée trop courte


"Croyez pas que j'vous abandonne même si, encore une fois, je vous laisse le pire: les larmes qu'on verse sur la mort d'un homme" (MS, 1997)










samedi 9 janvier 2010

whatever it takes


i'll hold it between my thighs
like a football

slam it into chords, give it a melody
hum it into obscurity

invite the raccoons at the door
to come in and eat their fill

call the rains down
pass out for days

you'll find me
quiet

quiet and dependent
so you can love me at will

something has to love this
thing we call a life

you are often gone now
on mulitple errands

or to your bed to compose
happier dreams

downstairs is a dying woman
on a couch

nothing makes us sadder
than to talk about that

hiding from mirrors
swallowing clonazepam

whatever it takes
not to talk about it

whatever it takes
not to feel a thing


jeudi 7 janvier 2010

Adieu, belle Lhasa...


photo de Carl Lessard


Communiqué officiel: "La chanteuse Lhasa De Sela est décédée à son domicile de Montréal pendant la soirée du 1er janvier 2010, un peu avant minuit./Un cancer du sein qu’elle a combattu avec courage et détermination pendant plus de 21 mois l’aura finalement emportée./Durant cette période difficile elle a continué à toucher la vie des gens qui l’entouraient avec la grâce, la beauté, et l’humour qui la caractérisaient./Elle a aussi réussi à terminer l’enregistrement de son dernier album et à assurer son lancement sur scène au Théâtre Corona de Montréal et au Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord à Paris. Les deux concerts donnés en Islande au mois de mai auront été les derniers où elle aura interprété ses vibrantes chansons." 


Voici le magnifique vidéo dessiné au crayon de plomb par Alex McLean et Kathleen Weldon, deux Montréalais hyper talentueux: dessinateurs, réalisateurs, et membres du group Rothschilds (www.myspace.com/therothschilds).

  

Lhasa | Clips vidéo MySpace



Lhasa de Siem en live et en espagnole

Daniel | MySpace Vidéo



Update 8/01/09: Special émission d'Acoustic ce soir sur TV5 sur Lhasa!

Keane - Spiralling

sparrow is spiralling...



somewhere only we know...

mercredi 6 janvier 2010

MOVE YOUR MONEY

let's fix this mess. this year, make a resolution to MOVE YOUR MONEY!

what-the-fuck IS happyness?



happyness
what the fuck!
when was I happy
and when was i not?
and if i have ever been
HAPPY
was there any unity
with what was real
or was it an
adrenaline flow
like a volcano of
ecstatic blood
being in love, being one
with god or monster
being lesbiana
being the stranger
being l'unique, the courageous
being krishna's devotee
or jehovah's whore
reaching the watchtower
on top of the world
falling upon the
portes de paris unaware
motoring around
a greek island
getting lost in an
indian town on my
way to meet the
guru who is
waiting to meet
me because, well
my karma must be good
is good, is perfect!
buying books by the pound
buying designer clothes
at goodwill or
reading anais nin's
little birds, becoming
sparrow of her
satanic verses or
worse! rushdie...

having babies
offering them my breast
dressing them up
seeing them off
on their way to
their own nests

eating christmas
candy, eating curry
wearing comfortable shoes
or finding cute boots to
match my miniskirt
losing 20 lbs
after tipping the scale
at 160 for years
chronically blimped
now hip now svelte
feeling like everybody
else at last then
adding a question mark
to strike a balance
such as
what the fuck
what the fuckity fuck
IS happyness when
somebody else is
bleeding somewhere
thanks to my bullet
when my sharp
tongue becomes viper
dreaming of a kiss
that never comes
then hearing a
mylène song
on the radio and
realizing it can't
be true because i'm
in oregon not in
france and no one
knows who-the-fuck
mylène is and
no radio plays
"ainsi soit il" and
"fuck them all" because
happyness is but
short lived, comes
when i've grown
another chin, when i live
an alternate universe
i ain't gonna
find it with long feathers

fuck happyness when
a bed lies unmade
waiting for my
cold body to float
into dream worlds
is that a happy-enough
thought to sustain me
if ever i decide to take
mick's advice:
if i try i might actually
get what i need???
fuck happyness!
i need paris


photo from wikipedia: porte de saint-denis

mardi 5 janvier 2010

Vénus: Les Mystères du Cosmos

Je viens de traduire "Vénus" de Gérard Manset, interprété par Alain Bashung... et j'ai trouvé ce vidéo très intéressant de Vénus, un épisode de la séries "Les Mystères du Cosmo". Après l'avoir regardé, venez voir ma traduction et un bon vidéo "live" de Bashung en concert à l'Elysée. J'ai besoin de visiteurs sur mon nouvelle blog de Bashung! http://bashung-in-english.blogspot.com/2010/01/venus.html 


samedi 2 janvier 2010

natural fibers



photo by moineau

cotton and silk
raw fibers to
caress le corps
wrap short thick legs
embellish softening arms

we tried polyester once
black and slippery
sexy you said
but couldn't wait
to peel it off

we even tried vinyl
but knew it was
a terrible mistake
when a maiden ran
crying from the house

give me cotton
fuzzy sweaters washed
two hundred times
ribbed legwarmers cuffed
at knee and ankle

dress my neck in
chinese silks
thin and tearable, with
cherry blossoms to wrap around
my extra large head

drown me in fabric
cotton caftan or jilbab
i'll flow like a river
under your swaying boat
water lapping at your lips

on a large flat bed
soft undergarments strewn
across the floor and furniture
you will kiss noontide shadows
under the passion tent

vendredi 1 janvier 2010

Once in a blue moon... or twice! Happy New Year!



photos by moineau, 31 decembre 2009


Rare 'blue moon' to ring in 2010

from the Associated Press

By ALICIA CHANG, AP Science Writer Tue Dec 29, 7:03 pm ET

LOS ANGELES – Once in a blue moon there is one on New Year's Eve. Revelers ringing in 2010 will be treated to a so-called blue moon. According to popular definition, a blue moon is the second full moon in a month. But don't expect it to be blue — the name has nothing to do with the color of our closest celestial neighbor.

A full moon occurred on Dec. 2. It will appear again on Thursday in time for the New Year's countdown.

"If you're in Times Square, you'll see the full moon right above you. It's going to be that brilliant," said Jack Horkheimer, director emeritus of the Miami Space Transit Planetarium and host of a weekly astronomy TV show.

The New Year's Eve blue moon will be visible in the United States, Canada, Europe, South America and Africa. For partygoers in Australia and Asia, the full moon does not show up until New Year's Day, making January a blue moon month for them.

However, the Eastern Hemisphere can celebrate with a partial lunar eclipse on New Year's Eve when part of the moon enters the Earth's shadow. The eclipse will not be visible in the Americas.

A full moon occurs every 29.5 days, and most years have 12. On average, an extra full moon in a month — a blue moon — occurs every 2.5 years. The last time there was a lunar double take was in May 2007. New Year's Eve blue moons are rarer, occurring every 19 years. The last time was in 1990; the next one won't come again until 2028.

Blue moons have no astronomical significance, said Greg Laughlin, an astronomer at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

"`Blue moon' is just a name in the same sense as a `hunter's moon' or a `harvest moon,'" Laughlin said in an e-mail.

The popular definition of blue moon came about after a writer for Sky & Telescope magazine in 1946 misinterpreted the Maine Farmer's Almanac and labeled a blue moon as the second full moon in a month. In fact, the almanac defined a blue moon as the third full moon in a season with four full moons, not the usual three.

Though Sky & Telescope corrected the error decades later, the definition caught on. For purists, however, this New Year's Eve full moon doesn't even qualify as a blue moon. It's just the first full moon of the winter season.

In a tongue-in-cheek essay posted on the magazine's Web site this week, senior contributing editor Kelly Beatty wrote: "If skies are clear when I'm out celebrating, I'll take a peek at that brilliant orb as it rises over the Boston skyline to see if it's an icy shade of blue. Or maybe I'll just howl."


Happy New Year to friends and readers! xoxoxox